Broward Cultural Division invites school principals, teachers, and interested residents to participate in a great opportunity to nominate an outstanding arts teacher in Broward County for doing a remarkable job in dedication to this field. Arts teachers may also submit applications for themselves. The application deadline is February 28, 2011 at 5:00 p.m.

The Arts Teacher of the Year Award honors one outstanding arts teacher each year for his/her contribution and dedication to the arts in the classroom. The chosen recipient is honored during a ceremony at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in the fall, and receives a check for $2,500, a scholarship to Nova Southeastern University, a Tiffany crystal apple, an assortment of gifts from arts and cultural organizations and businesses, an inscribed brick on Riverwalk and a $500 contribution to the arts department at their school.

“This award celebrates the important work of arts educators, and the magical impact of the Arts in Education program that facilitates it,” says Mary A. Becht, Director, Broward Cultural Division. “One outstanding teacher is selected each year to represent the teaching excellence that exists in the school system.”

What's in the Numbers? A Workshop for Mastering the Power of Financial Tools

Broward Cultural Division, ArtServe, Inc. and Nonprofit Finance Fund (NFF) invite the area's cultural executives, non-profit managers, board members and development staff to a financial seminar. What's in the Numbers? A Workshop for Mastering the Power of Financial Tools will be held on Friday, March 4, 2011, from 9:00 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. at ArtServe Inc, 1350 East Sunrise Boulevard in Fort Lauderdale.

This workshop, designed and led by NFF, addresses issues for both new and experienced nonprofit managers facing increasingly challenging demands in the use of financial tools. This workshop encompasses a review of how to approach budgeting for successful annual financial management and external communications, how to use program economics as a method for making adjustments on the margin to improve overall performance, and concepts for thinking about and adjusting scenarios when operational changes occur.

If you have ever been asked to manage to a balance sheet or if you wish to learn how to better articulate your organization's goals and improve fiscal literacy, then this workshop is for YOU.

Nonprofit Finance Fund (NFF), www.nonprofitfinancefund.org, is a national leader in nonprofit, philanthropic and social enterprise finance. NFF has a staff of more than 75 serving nonprofits nationally from offices in Philadelphia, New York City, Newark, New Jersey, Boston, Detroit, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

This Project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment of the Arts

Sustainable Communities

A meeting of great minds culminated in the recently-opened New World Symphony in Miami Beach. The venue is a remarkable work of art, space and aesthetic engineering conceived, designed and developed in collaboration, and led by internationally-renowned architect and designer Frank Gehry. As the perfect place to host a futuristic Regional Partnership Panel discussion, headed by New World Symphony Chair Neisen Kasdin, the forum consisted of Barack Obama-nominated National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Chairman Rocco Landesman and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Deputy Secretary Ron Sims. Further to that sterling leadership team were additional panel members from the community and the region-at-large.

"The high point of my tenure so far at the NEA was to see a joint press release between the NEA and the U.S.Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), for this event we are at today,” says Landesmen.

This strong consortium with its crystal clear message of artistic communities as a driving force for growth and development, have now put into place an additional system to continue the union of a seven-county mega region in South Florida – Indian River, St. Lucie, Martin, Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade and Monroe- who recently received a $4.25 million grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

“Every community today in the world, that is moving forward; cities that are on the radar screen, all include an incredible investment in the arts,” says Sims. “And those communities that are most committed to it, will be the ones that succeed in the most competitive century ever known to human kind.”

Orchestrated by the Southeast Florida Regional Partnership, the grant will be used to create a plan that would improve regional housing, land use, economic and workforce development and transportation, through the year 2060. It is a goal set to focus missions, ideas, resources, opportunities and enthusiasm—a hot bed of creativity and entrepreneurship with South Florida at its center. Key to bringing recognition to the region’s diverse cultural, historic, and ethnic assets, and developing inclusive regional partnership is participation by the South Florida Cultural Consortium, one of the partners of the grant, with support from the individual arts agencies in the seven counties.

“The Knight Foundation’s “soul of the community” poll shows three things that create community attachment: social offerings, openness and aesthetics; and what creates those three things, more than any other sector? The Arts,” says Landesmen.

Numerous examples of high-echelon success stories of economic development and arts connection, were passionately described by dedicated citizen-businessmen – Berton E. Korman, Palm Beach County; Alan Levy, Broward County and Adolfo Henriques, Miami-Dade County bringing the region together; while committed artist entrepreneur Xavier Cortada and South Florida Cultural Consortium Chair and Director of Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs, Michael Spring tied in the public sector aspects. South Florida Partnership Leader and South Florida Regional Planning Council Coordinator of Legislative & Public Affairs, Isabel Cosio, introduced the regional agenda.

The vision is for a sustainable mega South Florida Region with culture, landscape, community and verve. It makes sense; and it is already in the making. With a state-of-the-art symphony house, standing at the center of a vibrant Miami, leading the way with tentacles that branch north, in growing regions on the ocean, warm weather, performing arts centers and cultural districts, sustainable housing for artists and a joint partnership amongst each of the county’s for national leverage and geographical weight, it seems the vision is definitely be possible.

In response to the notion by members of Congress that cutting the arts will actually reduce the nation's deficit, Americans for the Arts President and CEO Bob Lynch pointed out that the arts support 5.7 million jobs in the United States that generate about $30 billion in taxes, nearly $13 billion of which goes to the federal government. Lynch said, "If they're serious about jobs and they're serious about income, they would invest more in the arts."

Taken from a New York Times Article, By Robin Pogrebin, January 24, 2011

A musical about a war-time romance and a controversial play that took audiences to the depths of humanity top the list of nominees for the 35th annual Carbonell Awards, celebrating the best shows and performances in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.

Miss Saigon at Actors’ Playhouse at the Miracle Theatre in Coral Gables led the pack with 11 nominations; Blasted at GableStage in Coral Gables garnered 7 nominations. The winners will be announced at the 35th annual Carbonell Awards ceremony to be held on Monday, April 4, at 7:30 p.m. in the Amaturo Theater at Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale.

South Florida’s answer to the Tony Awards and a highlight of each arts season, the Carbonell Awards pay tribute to the very best theatrical productions on local stages and features the area’s top entertainers and theater insiders as they step out from behind their roles in an unforgettable behind-the-scenes celebration. Companies in Broward County received 27 nominations, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach tied with 36 nominations each.

The annual awards ceremony raises scholarships for South Florida arts students. Along with New York's Drama Desk and Chicago's Joseph Jefferson Awards, the Carbonell Awards are among the nation’s senior regional arts awards and predate others including Washington, D.C.'s Helen Hayes and Philadelphia's Barrymore Awards.

Ticket information for the April 4 ceremony will be announced shortly.

Opportunities to sponsor an award category and appear on stage to announce the winner are available beginning at $1,000. Email carbonellhotline@gmail.com for more information.

The Broward Center is located at 201 S.W. 5th Ave. in Fort Lauderdale.

In February, the Miami Herald reported that Miami City Ballet (MCB) will cap off its 25th season in July by performing for the first time in Paris. The company will have a three-week season at one of the French capital’s major venues, the Theatre du Chatelet, for its annual Summers of Dance Festival.

MCB artistic director Edward Villella said that the opportunity was the company’s most important since its New York debut in January 2009. Villella said the Paris dates were largely a result of his troupe’s successful run in New York, where MCB earned rave reviews and a new level of notice from the dance world. The Theater du Chatelet website touts MCB as “one of the most important ballet companies in the United States."

For its Paris performances, which run July 6-23, the company will dance eight works by its signature choreographer, George Balanchine, among them Symphony in Three Movements, Square Dance, La Valse and The Four Temperaments, regarded as some of Balanchine’s most masterful and significant ballets.

Companies that have danced in previous editions of the Theatre du Chatelet summer festival, which was launched in 2005, include the San Francisco Ballet and the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. MCB is the only troupe featured at this summer’s event.

E-News Contact & Sign-up Info

Cultural Division E-News is distributed by the Broward Cultural Division. If you have questions, contact Jody Leshinsky 954-357-7463.